Coalition of environmentalists, farmers, First Nations says no to Site C dam

Groups argue Peace region has suffered from unrestrained resource development

The proposed Site C dam on the Peace River would flood about 3,000 hectares of prime B.C. farmland.

Photograph by: Brian Churchill
, Submitted

Aboriginals, farmers, and environmentalists are joining forces to defeat BC Hydro’s planned Site C dam on the Peace River.

They say the northeast has given up much for resource development — oil and gas, coal mining, logging, hydro power, and wind farms — and that the last best stretch of the Peace River should be permanently protected.

“Enough is enough,” Roland Willson, chief of the West Moberly First Nations, told The Vancouver Sun. “We need to slow down. It’s more important to maintain the integrity of what’s there than put it under water ... all to expand the industrial footprint.”

Natives say they won’t be bought off by BC Hydro.

“This valley is priceless,” insisted Liz Logan, tribal chief of the Treaty 8 Tribal Association. “There is no amount of money or land they can give us.”

A new report by the David Suzuki Foundation and Global Forest Watch Canada finds there are 28,587 kilometres of pipelines, 45,293 kilometres of roads, and 116,725 kilometres of seismic lines used for oil and gas exploration within the Peace region.

Laid end to end, all these roads, pipelines and seismic lines would circle the Earth nearly five times, the report finds.

“This is not about NIMBY — not in our backyard,” Willson said. “Everything is in our backyard.”

Site C is a planned third dam and 1,100-megawatt hydroelectric generating station on the Peace River between Hudson’s Hope and Taylor. It is currently undergoing a joint provincial-federal environmental assessment process.

BC Hydro says Site C is needed to meet future power demands, and predicts that the province’s electricity needs will grow by about 50 per cent over the next 20 years, driven by economic expansion and a projected population increase of more than one million residents.

The Crown corporation expects to deliver its environmental impact statement — thousands of pages of technical documents — early next year, after which the public has just 60 days to comment.

Willson emphasized that natives are not opposed to development in the northeast, but are drawing a line with the Site C dam.

“What we are opposed to is the flooding of that valley,” he said, calling for talks on alternative ways to meet B.C.’s energy needs,

Natives would prefer to win in the court of public opinion, but are prepared to take legal action if necessary to stop the dam.

“At the end of the day, if that’s what it takes, that’s where my nation is going to be,” he said. “We’ll go to court if we have to.”

Treaty 8, signed in 1899 with the federal government, allows northern natives, including those in B.C.’s Peace region, to maintain their traditional ways of life, Logan noted.

“That’s getting extremely hard for our people to do. We’re getting extremely concerned about the impact of what’s happening in our territory.”

She said Site C will flood a wildlife-rich landscape that also contains aboriginal burial and other archeological sites.

“Being nomadic people, we have sensitive areas through the entire territory,” Logan said. “The rivers were our corridors of transportation. Wherever our people got sick and died is where we left them. There is potential disturbance of ancestral remains.”

Farmer Ken Boon, located at Bear Flat on the Peace River, said the dam would destroy the best farmland north of Quesnel, and that BC Hydro’s property acquisitions over the decades in preparation for Site C have stifled agricultural development.

The dam would flood about 3,000 hectares of class-one and class-two farmland.

“I would describe Site C as the biggest threat to farmland in B.C. from a single project, by far,” said Boon, whose wife, Arlene, is a third-generation farmer in the Peace.

The David Suzuki Foundation commissioned Global Forest Watch Canada to conduct an analysis of land use from 1974 to 2010 over 56,000 square kilometres in the Peace.

That analysis finds that the region has been hacked to bits by unrestrained industrial development.

BC Hydro proposes an earth-fill dam 1,050 metres long and 60 metres high, an 83-kilometre-long reservoir, re-alignment of four sections of Highway 29, and two 77-kilometre transmission lines along existing transmission line right-of-way connecting Site C to Peace Canyon.

We encourage all readers to share their views on our articles and blog posts. We are committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion, so we ask you to avoid personal attacks, and please keep your comments relevant and respectful. If you encounter a comment that is abusive, click the "X" in the upper right corner of the comment box to report spam or abuse. We are using Facebook commenting. Visit our FAQ page for more information.

Almost Done!

Postmedia wants to improve your reading experience as well as share the best deals and promotions from our advertisers with you. The information below will be used to optimize the content and make ads across the network more relevant to you. You can always change the information you share with us by editing your profile.

By clicking "Create Account", I hearby grant permission to Postmedia to use my account information to create my account.

I also accept and agree to be bound by Postmedia's Terms and Conditions with respect to my use of the Site and I have read and understand Postmedia's Privacy Statement. I consent to the collection, use, maintenance, and disclosure of my information in accordance with the Postmedia's Privacy Policy.

Postmedia wants to improve your reading experience as well as share the best deals and promotions from our advertisers with you. The information below will be used to optimize the content and make ads across the network more relevant to you. You can always change the information you share with us by editing your profile.

By clicking "Create Account", I hearby grant permission to Postmedia to use my account information to create my account.

I also accept and agree to be bound by Postmedia's Terms and Conditions with respect to my use of the Site and I have read and understand Postmedia's Privacy Statement. I consent to the collection, use, maintenance, and disclosure of my information in accordance with the Postmedia's Privacy Policy.